Producing pellets in the form of pressed pellets by grinding the pellet material and further processing said material by employment of pressure and/or binding agent to afford the pellet is prior art. A process of this type requires that, prior to grinding, the pellet material already has a consistency suitable for the finished pellet.
Producing pellets from a melt is also prior art. This comprises melting the pellet material, pouring the melt into a pellet mould and cooling it therein. However, such cooling with simultaneous shaping entails complexity both in terms of process engineering and in terms of apparatus. For instance, cooling of a fused pellet must be performed under precisely controlled conditions since excessively rapid cooling results in fracture of the pellet while excessively slow cooling leads to crystallization of the melt so that the pellet likewise loses its strength.
Accordingly there is a need for a method and an apparatus for producing a pellet preferably intended for subsequent chemical analysis, wherein said method and apparatus are substantially simpler, both in terms of process engineering and in terms of apparatus complexity, than previously known processes and apparatuses.